CDR Salamander shacked it today:
Back in May, in a rare set up for a smooth transition in an administration characterized by “acting” officials, gapped billets, backlogged...
cdrsalamander.blogspot.com
Thankfully he is much more articulate than I, as he has a wider audience.
Pickle
1) I disagree with CDR Salamander's assumptions. I think that what is in those emails is very relevant and this whole thing is about giving Bill Moran a soft landing to make sure that they don't go public.
2) The connotation of using the phrase 'sexual assault' sucks because I agree that most people associate the term with something worse, but if he slapped a woman on the ass that is technically what he did. Whether or not he was legally prosecuted is largely irrelevant to the Navy's administrative processes for handling the matter, as anyone who has been to a Captain's mast could tell you.
3) On the spectrum of shitty things you can do, drinking and driving is far worse than 'getting handsy.' Last time I checked, no one ever died from getting their ass slapped.
4) It is different when a 24 yr old gets drunk and acts stupid than when a 36+ yr old does it.
5) This 'alleged' event occurred very recently and there was a lot of press about how the commander wasn't held accountable as a direct result of his connection to the CNO.
This all adds up to a lot of bad optics for the Navy if Bill Moran were to go on to serve as the CNO. What's that phrase... perception is reality. Nothing to do with zero tolerance policies.